Information Related to "God, Science and the Bible (11/06)"
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The mystery of dark matter
The more scientists study the universe, the stranger it sometimes seems.
For instance, did you know that approximately 96 percent of the forces that sustain the universe is not produced by ordinary matter and energy?
Since 1933, scientists have measured the gravitational force holding galactic clusters, galaxies and solar systems together and have determined that only about 4 percent of it consists of ordinary matter. In other words, if you piled up all the known matter in the universe—all the stars, planets, cosmic dust and gases—and measured the gravitational effect their combined mass exerts, it would be only about 4 percent of the force necessary to hold things together!
Where is the remaining 96 percent of the missing mass, scientists ask? This has been a real puzzle for astronomers. One remarked that this is a case not of the dog wagging the tail, but the tail wagging the dog. It's as if more than 90 percent of the universe consisted of something other than atoms and photons, the bedrock of ordinary matter and energy.
The unseen force holding things together, scientists conclude, must be produced by other things—which, for lack of better terms, are classed as "dark matter" and "dark energy" ("dark" meaning they emit no radiation directly perceptible to us, whether visible light or otherwise).
Dark matter, the scientists believe, coexists with normal matter, but they still don't know what it is. Even stranger than dark matter is dark energy, for it appears to work across large distances and in an opposite way to gravity. This antigravity force seems responsible for the accelerating pace of the universe's ongoing expansion.
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